


Eye of the Monster

by qwanderer



Series: Midnight Mystery [19]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Darcy is a Tumblr SJ enthusiast, F/M, Game of Thrones References, Hulkeye pre-slash, M/M, Nightmares, Subjective Labels, politics of Asgard
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-11
Updated: 2013-10-14
Packaged: 2017-12-29 00:35:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/998754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing about being able to see with the eyes of a monster is that sometimes, just occasionally, they look like monsters to themselves, too.</p><p>These problems have no easy solutions.</p><p>(Four vignettes that express the state of the Midnight Mystery universe)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Bruce

Half the team was offworld again, and it had been a busy week. One encounter with giant squid in which Clint had sprained his ankle rather badly, and barely a day's rest (in which Natasha had practically sat on him in her insistence that he not aggravate his injury) before there was another call, a catastrophic series of floods and other problems caused by an accidental explosion in Panama. 

The spiders had gone, and the armored lovebirds, and the only people still in the tower were Clint, still out of commission, and Bruce, who tended to keep to himself. 

Clint had resigned himself to spending a horribly boring day or two hobbling around his apartment. 

But Bruce made a surprise appearance the next morning, carrying a tray and looking slightly hesitant. 

"Really, breakfast in bed?" Clint raised his eyebrows. 

"It's no problem," Bruce said mildly. 

"Don't get me wrong, I'm not objecting," Clint said, pulling the tray closer. "I could live off your hash browns. But I'm not used to special teatment. My arms are fine, I can cook for myself." 

"We're a team," was Bruce's answer. "You don't have to." 

"Uh huh," Clint said. "I understand the after-battle feast thing, Asgardian tradition and all, helps everyone wind down. Solid reasoning. But my getting a hot breakfast while I'm out of rotation is not exactly mission critical." 

Bruce settled himself on the chest Clint kept at the end of his bed, trying to figure out how and how much to explain. "Cooking is like a form of meditation for me," he said at last. "Except Hulk hates meditation. Partly, he associates it with the time when I had a lot of hostile feelings toward him. But also, he doesn't see how it's worth anything. I've learned it's a lot easier to get him to let me call the shots if I choose something with concrete benefits for someone else." He smiled. "Like breakfast." 

"Huh," Clint responded. "You've really got all this figured out, it seems like. A whole instruction manual on how to deal with troublesome Hulks." 

"And yet I still manage to find out something new every day," Bruce said. 

"Yeah, uh." Clint looked thoughtful as he paused. "Thor says you got up to some interesting shit while you were on your super science space adventure." 

"You could say that. I learned a lot," Bruce acknowledged with a nod. "Got to know a lot about Hulk I'd been unsure about before. Like how much he's conscious of what he is, how I think of him. Couldn't avoid it any more. It was... a pretty intense experience all around." 

"Yeah, and I hear you and Hel got along," Clint mentioned deceptively casually. "Loki did the 'angry dad speech,' I'm sorry to have missed that. So, misunderstanding, or did he get it right?" 

"Is there a reason you need to know?" Bruce had gone still, not freezing exactly, but his usual still awareness had perceptibly intensified. 

"What if there is?" Clint asked pointedly. 

"If it's because you think that it might compromise my control," Bruce rumbled, disgust and hurt apparent in his voice, "then yeah, I guess you need to know. Because it happened, it got to me, and it didn't end well. So if you want to know whether you should worry, then _worry._ " 

He realized there was more than a little Hulk in his voice, and he shut it down abruptly, looking away, looking for something else to focus on. He didn't want to look at Clint and see the fear or calculation or whatever expression must have been on his face at having his concerns confirmed. 

There was silence for a moment. "That wasn't why I wanted to know," Clint said calmly, and Bruce got up the courage to look his way. 

Bruce saw his earnest expression, and saw that it was true, and realized that things had changed for Clint during the time he'd been gone, as well. The archer, despite his protest about breakfast, didn't actually seem uncomfortable about having him around. Even after that near outburst. 

"I'm sorry," Clint continued. "Didn't mean to bring up a sore spot. You don't need to tell me anything; it's your personal life." He looked honestly regretful. 

Bruce gave up trying to decipher what was going on. "I don't get it," he said. "Why'd you ask?" 

"Forget about it," Clint said, looking kind of miserable. 

"I'm naturally curious," Bruce said. "Humor me." 

"So, uh," Clint said, rubbing a hand against the back of his neck and then scrubbing up through his hair. "I was kinda angling to know whether you were still single, subtle-like? And I guess I messed _that_ up craptastically." 

Bruce took a moment to process that, then smiled a little sadly. "Yeah, kind of." Then he sighed. "Clint, I don't... I don't date. I made an exception for Hel, because she is literally impossible to physically harm. There weren't going to be any exceptions, not ever. I thought that was a solid decision, but I am getting better at control, learning a hell of a lot. I keep finding reasons to hope. But I'm not ready to take that risk, and I can't ask anyone to wait for me. My girlfriend from before, she's moved on, and that's great, that was the right choice for her. Because I am a good bet for no one, Clint. I'm a risk, a risk I don't want anybody I care about to have to take." 

Clint just looked at him, kind of wary, kind of sad, then he shrugged. "Yeah, I got that idea," he said. "I just... I heard about you and Hel, and it made me realize stuff happens, and maybe I shouldn't wait any longer to tell you I'm interested, because what if I miss my chance? Gotta take the shot when I see it." He looked hopefully in Bruce's direction. "So c'mon, Doc, tell me. If you were gonna date, would I have a shot?" 

"Yeah, you would," Bruce said quietly. 

"In that case, I'm gonna stick close from now on, just in case," Clint said, smirking. 

"Did I not just finish saying I don't want anyone waiting for me?" Bruce said, beginning to be exasperated. 

"Bruce," the archer began, serious again. "Do you have any idea how much it takes for me to start trusting someone? Outside of the team I work with, it doesn't happen. So just, I mean, keep it in mind. We're fine, we're good, I'm not going anywhere." 

Bruce shook his head. "People keep trying to tell me I deserve happiness. Well, the rest of you do, too. Don't wait for me." 

"You know what would make me happy?" 

The look on Clint's face said he was waiting to deliver a punch line. "What?" Bruce asked warily. 

"For you to stick around, watch some TV with me so I don't go absolutely stir crazy," he said. When Bruce hesitated, he continued. "We're a team right? So help me out here." 

Bruce eventually, reluctantly, agreed.


	2. Reginunn

They set out in secret across the landscape of Asgard, horses and the necessary tools for a hunt obscuring their true purpose. The three warriors and one tiny scientist were met with friendly waves, Thor told them, only because they appeared to be going on a double date, and had told no one of the more serious business they intended to address. 

"I don't like hiding my intentions here," Steve argued. "Shouldn't people know what we're trying to do, if we want to change their minds about dragons?" 

"Dragons continue to raid the cities of Asgard," Thor explained to Steve. "Opening negotiations with them, if they will not cease hostilities, goes against the very nature of the Aesir people and our chosen place as uncompromising guardians of the Realms. I do not even know how to begin changing that." 

Steve frowned. "But why are they raiding? What do they take? Maybe they have a good reason." 

"They covet the gold and treasures of our cities," Thor said, shaking his head. "They hunt for food in their own lands, and come to our homes only to steal those things they could have no possible use for." 

"But do you know that for certain, is that what they tell you?" Jane asked. "Or do you sort of just assume there are no other factors at play? Because if what you've told me is true, and dragons get killed pretty often by Asgardians, why would they risk their lives just to get more shiny things? Maybe they're using it for something." 

"When we empty one of their lairs, we find it, still in the form it was taken, mountains of it, heaped together. Hiding even the shine of those pieces underneath. We believe they sleep on it, like a great nest of stolen gold. I cannot fathom dragons, and I have long since ceased to try." Thor huffed a frustrated sigh. 

"I once had such contempt for them," Sif said. "I thought them stupid, careless beasts. Until my encounter with the Avengers made me begin to question everything I ever believed. And then came Reginunn. Steven talked to him as if he were a person, and he responded in kind. I think Lady Jane is right. I think they must have a reason." 

"Most people do," Steve said. "Loki did. It was just a matter of figuring out how he saw things that was so different from how we were seeing them. I'd venture there's something like that here, something you're not seeing," he told Thor. 

"I once thought I knew everything," Thor said ruefully. "The Realms seemed so simple, then. But now, the more I learn, the more I do not understand." 

"That's why we're here," Jane said. She spoke confidently, reaching across to nudge Thor and knock him out of his depressing turn of thoughts. She managed not to make it too obvious that the motion almost unbalanced her from her horse. "To give you a new perspective, a new way of looking at things. That can change a lot. Remember what happened when Bruce and Hel got you to look at magic a different way?" 

He smiled gently at her. "That was unexpectedly effective. I will try to follow your lead in this, as well. Perhaps we will find that there is something more to this than it has always seemed." 

They rode toward the place where the dragon Reginunn had last been seen, the stone ridge on which he liked to sun himself some afternoons. On their previous meeting, Steve had mostly talked, entertaining the great lizard enough to be of more interest as a talking plaything than as prey, and at the same time being the one to put forward his trust first, but Reginunn had eventually told Steve a few things about his life in turn. 

"So he might be there, it's sunny now," Steve said as they got closer to the spot. 

"Of course, I have not called the storm," was Thor's answer. "Mother does it when I am away longer than a fortnight, but now the rains are under my command." 

Steve shook his head in wonder and disbelief. Nothing here was just nature. No wonder they thought of themselves as gods. 

They secured their horses and scaled the cliff, finding that the dragon was indeed stretched across the ledge. Reginunn lifted his head to peer at them, but when he saw Steve, Sif, and no one looking like they were about to dig into him with a weapon, he lay his head back down on his front claws and closed his eyes. 

The dragon looked very tired, in fact, and leaner than they'd last seen him. 

"Hey, Reggie," said Steve. "How've things been? Is your wound bothering you?" 

Reginunn sighed a great breath, opening one eye to fix it on Steve. "No," he said, "and I must thank you for making it quick and clean. It has healed well. But still, the incident has made things difficult for me." 

"How, if you don't mind my asking?" Steve sat down by the dragon's head, which made Thor's eyes boggle a bit. This docile creature was not what experience had led him to expect. Thor looked at Sif, who merely displayed pride at the courage and ingenuity of her spouse. Jane, he saw, was full to the brim with excitement, some of which might have been terror, but certainly not all. 

Reginunn stirred himself again, shifting his head until it lay against Steve's left side. "My wife saw that I was free of the gem, and when I explained what had happened, that I had been friendly with a hero on a quest for the Allfather, she told me to leave and not to come back. I have not rested well, since." 

"That's terrible!" Jane exclaimed. "Is there anything we can do to help?" 

"I fear not," he said. "Without leave to enter our den, and without heart to make another, I will die." 

Steve frowned. "You can't just find another cave?" 

"The shelter of walls," Reggie rumbled, "is of little consequence if a dragon has no trove for them to protect." 

They all blinked at the great beast, not understanding. It was Jane who realized what he must mean. 

"Without gold... you'll die?" 

Reginunn sighed again. "Yes." 

"How can that be true?" Thor asked, frowning with doubt. "You do nothing with it, you only steal it, hide it away, cover it! Why?" 

"Why? Why do you build your palace of it, feel comfortable within your shining walls? Why do you adorn yourselves with it when not in your fighting array? Why do you eat the gold-skinned apples that grow in Idunn's orchard? Because gold is life, gold is rest, gold is renewal. Without it, you, too, would wither, age, and die." 

He rested his head against Steve once more, and all eyes now went to the golden band which he wore on his left ring finger - against Asgardian tradition, even when he was garbed for battle - and that the dragon had been as close to as he possibly could, for the entire conversation. 

"There can be no true rest," Reginunn said, "without a bed of gold." 

There was silence for a moment. Then Thor said, "Why did you not explain?" 

Reggie chuckled, a horrible deep rattling sound. "When before in Asgard's history has an As stopped to hear what a dragon has to say?" 

"But if you keep raiding, Aesir will keep hunting." It was a mere fact, but Sif still sounded thoughtful and sad saying it. 

"We can't stop raiding. If we stop raiding, we die. There are always more dragons, more whippets who need their own troves. There are always troves rooted out by dragon-slaying Aesir and returned, for your own comfort, to your own homes. We are your natural enemies." 

Another silence, longer and even more solemn. Then Jane spoke. 

"We're going to fix this," she said. "I don't know how, but we'll figure out a way. Nothing's impossible." Determination permeated her tone. 

Thor nodded, taking heart from her enthusiasm. "Where do we start?" he asked her. 

"Well," she said, pondering. "In the long term, research will help, so we understand what we're dealing with so we can communicate better. We're going to have to spread the word and convince people, and it might possibly involve some kind of huge economic change. Which I'm sure someone who actually understood economics would be more daunted by. I just know it needs to happen." Her nose wrinkled as she thought. "But for now? Well, we've got one example of a dragon living in harmony with Aesir, and we can't let that slip through our fingers. We've got to save Reggie." 

She approached the dragon, kneeling down by the other side of his head from where Steve sat. "Hello, Reginunn. My name's Jane Foster, of Earth. I'm pleased to meet you. I've always wanted to meet a dragon." 

"Have you really?" the lizard rumbled. "What on Earth have you heard about them?" 

She gave him a sort of awkward guilty moue, and said, "Well, mostly I've read Anne McCaffrey books, honestly, and The Hobbit of course. All completely made up stuff. Humans get pretty fascinated by things that show up in our history but that we've never seen evidence of ourselves. I've wanted my whole life to see things on other worlds, meet different kinds of people. May I?" she asked, holding out a hand to his scaly snout, seeing as the dragon seemed to appreciate Steve's proximity. 

The dragon looked surprised. "If you like," he said tiredly. 

Her fingers slid over the blue-green-black, beetle-iridescent scales. "How far is your den?" she asked him. 

It wasn't far, and they decided that they might as well try to get Reggie installed there again - they really didn't have much to lose. But before he showed them the way, Reggie made them all swear not to harm his babies. 

"Oh, you have babies?" Jane exclaimed, then made a valiant effort to keep herself in check and not alarm Reginunn. "I would never," she told him. "I swear on the large Hadron collider." 

"Will that bind her?" Reggie asked Steve. 

"I think it'll do," Steve answered. He had acquired an understanding from the science contingent as to how important it was, if he was still completely lost about what it actually did. Steve swore his own Christian oath, and Thor and Sif upon the throne of Asgard. 

And so, a few minutes later, they found themselves standing outside a dragon's lair. 

"Hallkatla," he called. "Please let me in." 

A blue-scaled head peeked out at them, then, startled, withdrew again. 

"Why are there Aesir on my doorstep?" a voice quavered. 

"I'm human," Jane volunteered. 

The head appeared again, narrowing its eyes at her. "How did a _human_ come to be here, then?" Hallkatla asked. 

"I came to Asgard as Thor's guest because I wanted to meet dragons," she said. "And help make peace between dragons and Aesir." 

The blue dragon's eyes flicked to Thor, then widened. "Why is the _crown prince of the Nine_ on my doorstep?" she said in what was almost a whisper, although given her size, it rather carried. 

"I come in peace," Thor said, and set down his hammer, showing his empty hands. "On behalf of Asgard, I request that Reginunn be allowed into this dwelling, because he will be your ambassador in our court, and we wish for his continued health." 

The movement of Hallkatla's head in response was somehow indicative of indecision. She looked now at Reginunn, seeming torn. 

"So be it," she said finally, withdrawing. "We will both be traitors to our kind, together, and on your head be it, Reginunn." 

Reggie sighed in relief, and welcomed them inside, where a heap of various gold artifacts took up half the floor space, and Hallkatla coiled tightly into a corner behind the hoard, watching. 

The babies, three tiny (well, five foot long, but slim) flapping lizards, ran to greet their father and see the curious new guests he'd brought. They were afraid of the warriors, but when they learned that Jane was mortal and not at all trained in fighting, they curled around her, all curiosity and enthusiasm, and asked her too many questions at once. 

She grinned and answered what she could, and after enough 'I don't know's they got bored and settled about her person. Thor watched her, in love with her wonder and enthusiasm. 

"You seem to have a taste for this sort of task, after all," he commented. 

"Yeah, I do," she said, petting the head of the tiny lizard wrapped around her neck. Then she looked up at him, realization in her eyes. "Oh - I'm gonna be a Khaleesi!" 

Thor laughed, deep and gentle. "I am not a Khal." 

Jane rolled her eyes. "Oh, stop it. You know what I meant." 

He smiled. "I do. But this will not be an easy path, a supporter of dragons on the Asgardian throne. You will suffer even more defiance than you would for simply being something they do not understand. You will be something they hate." 

She looked at him grimly. "I know. But with these people? I wouldn't have it any other way." 

"I knew you would be great, and brave, and uncompromisingly yourself," he said, holding tight to both her hands. "Whatever way you chose to spend your life. I am glad you have chosen to spend so much of it with me." 

A widening smile covered her face. "So am I."


	3. Hel

Darcy didn't know quite what to expect from Helheim. 

There was a lot going on, and Loki couldn't be spared from Avengers duty on Earth, but he insisted that there was so much she could learn from Hel about magic, especially with the breakthroughs she and Bruce had made on the subject of different types of magic and mental training. So Darcy approached the gates of Helheim alone, with some trepidation. They were tall and dark and as bleak as the landscape around them. 

"Yo," she called. "Anyone home?" 

The gates opened and a woman appeared, soft white velvet dress helping to mute the sharp contrasts of her face and hair, deep blue, black, and red on one side, pale, golden brown and grey on the other. She smiled as she saw Darcy. "Welcome," said Hel. "Father told me to expect you. You are his new apprentice," she said, and it wasn't a question. "I've seen you in his mind." 

"Yeah, heard a lot about you too," Darcy said, smiling lopsidedly as she eyed the gate, giving one last chance for all her doubts to catch up with her before stepping through into the timeless place that was Helheim. 

Today the entrance hall was a walled garden dancing with fireflies. Darcy decided she liked it. "Nice," she said, nodding around at it. "Kinda feels like what people must be going for when they staple Christmas lights and hang dried flowers all over their dorm rooms." 

Hel laughed, picturing the phenomenon from her words. "When one is stuck in a space, one does what one can with it. I simply happen to have a superior toolbox." 

"That you do," Darcy agreed, finding a swing to slump down into, out of habit, since she wasn't tired. That would probably have required bodily functions. "I'm not that great at illusions, personally. Not sure if I have the imagination for it." 

"It doesn't require... imagination, precisely," Hel said, climbing onto a convenient nearby branch and sitting as well. "More... the ability to hold many pieces of visual information in one's mind, and reconcile them with other input on the fly." 

"Yeah, that," Darcy agreed. "I don't have it." 

"And yet I hear that you have impressive skill with working magic on bodies, animals and plants," Hel pressed. "If Loki were to do that, he would be using that same skill to produce a cohesive picture of the result he wanted." 

Darcy shrugged expressively at the queen. "That? Is not what I do. Unless I've practiced the spell a lot, I still have no idea what the heck is gonna happen half the time." 

Hel's eyes widened. "And Father lets you _heal?_ With _no concept_ of the changes you wish to bring about?" 

"I know, right?" Darcy turned similar goggle eyes on Hel. "I keep telling him, some day it's all gonna go wrong and I'll turn someone's kidneys into oysters by accident. But the healing I do, it's pretty consistent, and I only use it in emergencies." 

"That... is intriguing," said Hel. "How does it seem to you, when you heal? What is your intent?" 

"To get them back to normal," Darcy said. "We tested, and people with chronic problems, I can't fix them. And sick people, not so good with that either. Loki says he could, some of the things, if he spent enough time and energy. But I just go bippity-boppity-boo and whatever changes, changes. If someone had a bad back, or an amputation, and then they get the hell blasted outta them by some wierdo's secret weapon, and I come in and heal 'em? No magically fixed back, no new arm. Just them, back to normal." She shrugged again. "Kinda good to know there's rules and limits, you know. I'm not really sure I'd wanna be part of the whole 'god' thing anyway." 

Hel considered her thoughtfully. "It sounds as though the healing you do is a sort of short-term non-delineated reversion," she said. "Asking the body to return to a base state. And the immune system, brain and nerves would be resistant to such a change, which would go some way to explaining their still having their memories. Has there ever been numbness or memory loss as a side effect, especially in people with head wounds?" 

"Yeah." Darcy gave a little shudder. "Now and then. There's been people... that maybe I should have just let them die. I healed their bodies, but then their brains just... didn't? It freaks me out." 

"Selective reversion," she said. "You're cautious, and you don't want to change what makes a person themselves. So you instinctively leave the primary nervous system out of your spells. But if there is a large amount of damage, especially a head wound, you may want to know how to change your spell to a generalized reversion. There will be some memory loss, since ideally, their minds will revert along with their bodies to the last time they were whole." 

"Yeah." Darcy was quiet. 

"It may be difficult to learn," said Hel. "But you have the power for it, and the spirit." 

"You sure about that?" Darcy said, looking at the goddess somewhat uncertainly. 

"Yes," Hel answered. "Otherwise you would not still do what you do, now that you have seen the possible consequences." 

It was shortly after that that the magic lessons truly began. 

Hel was deeply knowledgeable about magic, and so it made sense for her to lecture Darcy a little, but after a time it became clear that Hel expected very little of the intellect of this human girl. Darcy started to push back, to assert her opinions, and Hel began to show exasperation. 

Darcy was shaking her head. "Explain this to me again. How is Loki's version of the spell 'more efficient' if he has to do all these calculations before he can even start casting?" 

"It does not matter," Hel said. "Now, the concept here is fairly simple..." 

"But I want to know," Darcy insisted. "I feel like there's something important I'm missing in the whole spell structure concept, and maybe hearing you explain that would help." 

Hel sighed. "I see no use in explaining why we do the things we do to someone who will never use magic in the same way. You have no need to know." 

"Well, excuse me for being curious." 

"You are excused." 

Darcy huffed. "If you don't want to explain, just say so, but don't make it about me. I'm good here. If I still don't get it, that'll tell me something too." 

"I will tell you that something right now. You lack the capacity, the necessary context, to understand. It would be a waste of my time. And if you continue to distract me from the subjects Father wished me to help you with, _you_ are a waste of my time." 

Darcy stood straight up, glaring at Hel. "What are you even... I don't see you throwing out all the _books_ you've got stashed away in here just because they're about, I don't even know, cooking or pottery or something else you can't ever do!" 

Hel's eyes narrowed. "Is it absolutely necessary that you bring up the limitations of my existence here?" 

"I don't know, is it? 'Cause I'm getting the feeling that you've got _my_ limits pretty much permanently on your mind. And you don't even know them! You don't know what I'm capable of, what I might be able to do with information I pick up here and the brain I already have. But if I'm not worth your time, maybe I should just leave!" 

Hel looked at her, surprised. "All the things I've done, the power I wield over defenseless minds, and _this_ is what you decide to object to?" 

"I've read the terms and conditions, I know you get a certain amount of control over people's minds while they're here. You can't help that. And the not knowing it was rude on Jotuneim? Can't exactly know until someone tells you. But this? This I'm not gonna put up with. This is disrespecting people just as sentient as you, just as important as you, and I mean that. Everybody's got a purpose. Everybody changes the course of history. And you _don't_ put them down until you know what it is they can do." 

Hel frowned at her. "Changing the course of history is not necessarily a good thing. I've seen monsters, Rose Witch, of all kinds, and in my experience you should count yourself lucky if you go unnoticed by history, living your life in obscurity." 

"Well, in _my considerable expertise_ on the subject of history and the behavior of large groups of people and what gets remembered, the people who get forgotten have crap lives, Your Majesty. Nobody gets to live without a big pile of angst showing up in their front yards at one point or another. The people who get remembered at least have the satisfaction of knowing that they tried to change things." 

"What makes you think you know more than I on the subject of history?" Hel scoffed. 

"Not _more,_ " Darcy corrected. "But something you don't, yes. I was a scientist before this happened to me. I have a degree in anthropology and I've got some published work under my belt. Soft science, yes, but it ain't nothing." 

Hel gave her a look, skeptical and pitying. "Midgardian science." 

"Oh, is this how you treat Tony when he comes around?" Darcy asked with faux curiosity in her wide eyes. "Something tells me it isn't. Because if it was, your dad would get real pissed. He's kinda got a brain boner for just how much 'Midgardian science' that guy can do, and what he does with it. And what about Bruce? You want to tell me you don't see him as an intellectual equal?" She laughed suddenly and mockingly, on a single exhale. "Oh, maybe you don't. I bet that went over well. He did get home even grumpier than usual." Darcy shook her head. "So let me be the one to tell you, you're pretty rude, by Earth standards." 

"You are young," said Hel. "I hardly think you could be considered an authority on anything at this point." 

"Says the girl who became queen of this rock when she was _ten._ So what right did you have to say how this place ought to be run?" 

Hel eyed her with disbelieving interest. Finally she said, "Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I trust my own ideas and extrapolations too far." 

Darcy looked surprised to have gotten that concession, but still expectant and skeptical. Hel continued. 

"I barely know Aesir society. I make my own rules, and none can stand against me. Most who know my powers are afraid of me. Loki and Tony live by their own rules, but those rules are honed and shaped by their lives and the people who know them. The people who have told them what is acceptable and what is not. No one has stood before me, unafraid, and told me that I could not do a thing I meant to do, not that understood how impossible it would be to stop me." Hel gave the girl a long, appraising look. "Darcy Lewis, I think that you are exactly what I have been waiting for." 

Darcy chuckled almost drunkenly. "Well that is a direction I never expected this conversation to go," she said. 

"So you are an expert on human society," Hel pondered. "Then, Darcy Lewis, tell me about the world that so changed my father and my uncle." 

The conversation that followed was very different in its balance, Hel trying to learn from Darcy and treat her as an equal, though she was so much younger and less experienced. They talked about politics, power imbalances, the Occupy movement; racism and what it did to people, including its role in Loki's life; feminism and why Darcy was so into it. 

"Like, guys can look at a hot girl and express appreciation, and nobody cares, but God forbid I should ogle anybody, or worse, actually say outright I think they're sexy. Because apparently, that would make me shallow and/or desperate." 

"And you feel the need to do this... often?" Hel asked, forehead wrinkling. 

"Oh yeah, most girls do. Not all, but that's another issue. Y'know, one of my favorite things about Thor is that he did. Not. Blink. He just smiled, kinda like 'yeah, I know, right?' He totally knows he's hot." 

Hel looked a bit taken aback. 

"Earth culture is pretty confused about it right now, honestly. It's kind of a 'damned if you do, damned if you don't' thing. I mean, relationships? We're kind of expected to be in one at all times, like, if it ever comes up, we should just count ourselves lucky. But sex? Like, just sex? I happen to like it, and I don't let the haters bother me. But it's not always that easy, especially now that I'm an Avenger. The magazines are hella all up in our lives, I swear last time I had a good lay who wasn't vetted by SHIELD, they had every detail on the internet before sunrise. But somehow having government regulated sex is even more skeevy than having practically public sex." 

Hel looked both intrigued and somewhat disapproving. "Forgive me, but... you make it sound as if you are quite a strumpet." 

Darcy made an expression as if she were drawing in breath through her teeth. "Annd... I'm gonna need to stop you again. Slut words? No pointing 'em at other people. It's a rule." 

"That offends you?" Hel asked. "But you said as much of yourself. And I've been called worse, Father has, many times over. No one gets to pick and choose how people speak of them. It's not practical, policing people's words." 

"Well, we try to keep it simple," Darcy said. "I think this is pretty manageable. Don't judge, don't label. Simple rules." 

"And do you not judge?" Hel asked, more curiosity than superiority this time. "Do you not judge me, whether I am worthy to rule? Do you not judge those people who you thwart in their plans, as one of Earth's heroes?" 

"I stop them. I don't judge them. Besides, I'm really more rescue and medic." 

"Then do you not label yourself, scientist, mage?" 

Darcy leaned forward to look at Hel pointedly as she answered. "Yeah, but here's the thing. _I'm allowed._ Me. I'm the only person allowed to label Darcy Lewis." 

"But not saying things does not change their truth." 

Darcy shook her head. "It changes a whole lot," she said. "It can change people's lives." 

"What good would it do me to claim I am no longer half-Jotunn?" Hel asked, frowning. 

"Not very much," said Darcy, "unless you stop using Jotunn as a negative label." 

Hel's two different eyes were pinned on Darcy with a thirsty intensity now. "Explain, please." 

"All right, uh." Darcy thought for a moment, then she thought of something, and she perked up excitedly. "Bruce says you can hear context. Like, you know what people mean by words you don't know because you sort of listen _past_ the level of words." 

"That's right," Hel said. 

"So you should know that words mean very different things depending on who's saying them, and how." 

Hel nodded, beginning to see. 

"Like, take the word 'geek.' Two or three decades ago, it would have been an insult you called someone on the playground before you punch 'em in the face. Now, Tony Stark calls himself that on the regular. Because geeks took back the label and made it mean everything that they liked about themselves. And while I don't like you calling me a strumpet, because you say it like it's icky, I can call myself a slut, because I'm proud of how I act. You hear the difference?" 

Hel blinked. This was fascinating. 

"Ask Steve sometime to say those words for you - it should be educational." She grinned mischievously. "Now listen. Listen very carefully. Monsters are adorable." 

Hel swayed with the impact that made on her. "You mean that." 

"Well, between Sesame Street and Monsters, INC, I really got the positive meaning along with the negative one, growing up." Darcy smiled. "I really think modern Earth culture is getting some things really right." 

Hel leaned forward. "Teach me more."


	4. Loki (and Tony)

The explosion in Panama, they found out when rescue was over and investigation begun, had involved Stark tech. 

The dregs of some old project that some mad scientist had rekindled, but based on an idea Tony had funded back in his weapons empire days. 

Tony hadn't reacted to the news outside of a tightness around his eyes as he continued, working to save people and prevent this from happening again. But Loki noticed. 

So when they finally got a chance to rest, and Loki got woken up in the middle of the night by the thrashing of his partner, he had a pretty good idea as to why. 

Tony Stark in the grip of a nightmare was not an uncommon sight for Loki. They'd gotten milder, over the past year especially, to the point where Loki usually didn't try to wake him, instead running a comforting hand over Tony's back or arm or whatever was convenient until his frowning and muttering settled back down into contented sleep. 

But this was different; Tony was in the grip of something terrible, whining and throwing his limbs about so violently that Loki was afraid he would injure himself. 

"Tony," he said loudly into the blue-lit darkness, grasping one of the man's arms. 

Tony's eyes snapped open, and he clung to Loki, but his eyes still darted and he shook and Loki feared that he wasn't quite awake, hadn't escaped from whatever place he had gone to. 

Loki stroked his back, cradling the billionaire against his chest, reminded of the jarring difference between his daughter the shrouded princess of Asgard, and his daughter the queen and ultimate ruler of Niflheim. Loki knew very well the strength and power of this man, and never held against Tony his need for comfort. 

He listened to Tony's quiet, rambling words, wondering what the man's demons were telling him tonight. 

"...too much power, no one should have all that, but you can't stop it, I can't stop it, never do enough..." 

The man was ambitious, Loki had known that from the start, seen it in his ridiculously ostentatious tower when he'd first arrived here with intent to start a war. Tony Stark wanted to stop the foolish fighting, allow people to be free from their terrible array of choices of how to kill and maim one another, as much as Loki had insisted he did, back then. The speech was a ploy, an attention-getter, he didn't know beforehand what excuse he was going to give, but Loki found the words flowing loud off his tongue and he knew that there was some aspect of truth to them. It seemed as if, ever since, Loki and Tony's relationship had been one long exercise in reminding each other that there was no way to stop humans from being violent, destructive idiots. But Loki had to admit that if the goal was to minimize that toll of destruction, Tony Stark was far better at it than he had ever been. 

"...couldn't get there in time, didn't think I'd make it but I had to try, right? You always have to try, otherwise there's no point in living. I couldn't waste it, not... not after Yinsen... " 

Tony Stark was an unparalleled example of courage. Hanging off that abyss, sure that the mistakes and miscalculations he had made had all caught up to him and there was no way to set things right again, Loki had let go, and in the same place Tony had held on, changed everything, become Iron Man. Loki was convinced that, even without the apple, Tony would never give up his hold on life. He was too good at living. 

"...told me I wouldn't lay down on the wire, not like the heroes he used to know, and you know, the worst part, I never wanted to be a hero. I don't wanna die, I don't wanna fight, but if I can save someone, how can I not?" 

_One day I will murder the Captain,_ Loki promised himself, a faithless promise from the God of Lies. 

"...damn portal like an eye, staring me down and telling me it's the end, not gonna make it back. Almost hurled, but I went through. That make me a hero? People seem to think..." 

Loki held on, didn't twitch, though he wanted to throw Tony off of him, remove his unworthy self from the bed of this hero. He breathed very deliberately, told himself to settle, combed fingers through his darling's hair and sat quietly with his self-hatred. 

"...my fault, though, I funded that project, looked at it and thought 'that looks promising,' God, you can see the potential now, can't you? And I juggled that kind of idea all day, every day, never thought about the dark side, never thought one day I'd be chasing down old employees to stop them blowing up half a country..." 

"Your legacy of destruction is nothing when compared to mine." 

Tony was more settled now, more coherent, which was good, but it also meant he looked up at Loki when the Jotunn spoke, looked at him with worry and knowing. 

"And how do you face it?" the engineer asked. 

"I don't," Loki answered. "I run, I hide, I pray to forget, I pretend I am someone else. But there is no escaping what I am. I am a devil, and someday you will realize that. Someday you will realize how much better than me you are, and you will reject me and everything that I am, everything I have done." He studied his hand where it lay blue against the pale sheets. "Perhaps I should save you the grief..." 

"Don't. You. Dare." Tony sat up and looked at him steadily for the first time since he'd woken up. "I'm not running from the life I've got, good or bad, and neither are you. We're doing good. We're helping people. Running's not gonna do that. And I know you, honeypie, don't think I don't. I know you right down to your evillest, most devious plot. You've got hundreds, your mind breeds them like bunnies. They're beautiful and terrible and the world never sees a sign of any of 'em. And that's as good as it gets, take it from Midgard's favorite hero. Humans can be idiots. Some days I wanna leave 'em all in the rubble. But I won't, because that wouldn't do anything to improve my day. And neither are you. You're not gonna give up, you're not gonna run, you're gonna stay here with me and play hero and we're gonna fool everybody so well that maybe someday we'll be able to fool ourselves." 

Loki sighed, and curled tighter around Tony. "I will stay," he said. "I will stay as long as you want me." 

"Good," said Tony, and snuggled into his side, relaxing back into his rest.


End file.
